If You Must Cheat, Cheat Death
by Venstre
Summary: He was there during Spock's last moments, clutching his First Officer's hand and failing to fight back tears. He can't be dead. He just can't. Kirk/Spock in later chapters, and rated for language, violence and death.
1. Prologue

**Title**: If You Must Cheat, Cheat Death  
><strong>Description<strong>: He was there during Spock's last moments, clutching his First Officer's hand and failing to fight back tears. He can't be dead. He just can't. Kirk/Spock slash, rated for language, violence and death.  
><strong>Pairing(s)<strong>: Kirk/Spock  
><strong>Word Count<strong>: -  
><strong>Notes<strong>: This was originally just meant to be a short one-shot about mourning, but after deciding that never will I ever be able to write actual deathfics where the characters have to stay dead it turned into something more. It's a new-universe so loosely based on the third movie, The Search for Spock, that they shouldn't be used in the same sentence and should in no way be considered a rewrite. The whole Genesis planet and transferring of katra are about the only similarities between the two, because I needed them for writing's sake if I was to bring Spock back.

So here's the finished product, full of sad and grieving and a totally whacked timeline. This is my first shot in a while at a long fic, so bear with me.

Sorry, guys, nothing from this fantastic series belongs to me.

* * *

><p><strong>One<strong>

Somewhere in the back of Kirk's mind, he knew that they had done it. They'd won. They'd finally created this new planet, Genesis, fought off Khan, and won.

Though at that moment, he was too busy clawing against the muddy ground, blood soaking his uniform and pain rippling through his torso. Rain beat mercilessly against his body, soaking him to the bone and lightening the hue of his blood.

He needed to find Spock.

They had both been on the machine when they'd finally destroyed it, working together to tear the guts and wires out and cause it to malfunction. Except there had to be the goddamned self-destruct feature on it. Of course.

Kirk cried out, clutching his stomach against the pain. Bones would be there soon; he knew it. Bones could come find them; Bones would fix them up, just as always…

Except he didn't know where Spock was. He'd been thrown farther back from the explosion, away from Kirk and away from the machine.

A cough ripped Kirk's attention back to the present, and he looked up to see a familiar shape lying against the ground. Pushing down the fiery agony that was now spreading, he dug his fingers deep into the mud and struggled to pull himself towards his First Officer.

It seemed like ages before he finally reached him, gritting his teeth in pain and breathing heavily. He fell to the ground beside the half-Vulcan, panting, and barked out a humourless laugh.

"We did it," Kirk breathed, turning to face him. "We finally did—"

He stopped mid-sentence, his eyes growing wide and his heart jumping into his throat in fear. A sharp piece of shrapnel had dug itself into Spock's side, green blood mixing in with the mud around them. Kirk let out a choking gasp, pushing himself up onto one arm despite the flare of pain to rest his other hand on the wound. He couldn't risk moving the piece of metal, but he could help stop the bleeding. Kirk pulled back his hand, his breathing quickening when it was brought back green with Vulcan blood.

"Spock!" he cried out, hauling himself over so he could place his hands against his First Officer's face. "Spock!"

There was no response, just slight, shallow breathing.

"_Spock!"_

Water dripped from his face and hair as Kirk hovered over him, desperation laced thickly in his tone. He gripped Spock's shoulders, shaking him lightly. The half-Vulcan's eyes flew open then, meeting Kirk with something like shock before his hands went up to clutch his captain's shirt.

"Jim," he gasped, face grimacing in pain when he tried to move.

"No Spock, stop," Kirk warned him, pushing him back down with a scowl of his own. "Don't move. No. You need to wait for Bones." Wait for Bones. When Bones came. If he came. For all he knew, the Enterprise was unaware of what had happened on the surface, and was awaiting Kirk's call to beam them up. He would have, too, if his communicator hadn't been destroyed in the blast.

Spock let out a groan of pain, and then collapsed against the air with a shuddering exhale. "Jim, the chance of…of my survival is less than—"

"_No,"_ Kirk growled at him, clutching his shoulders even tighter. "No. That won't…you're not going to die."

With a look of pity in his eyes, Spock smiled at him. Actually _smiled_. Any other day Jim would have reveled in the show of emotion he'd only ever caught fleeting glimpses of, but now, it only succeeded in scaring the living shit out of him.

"Don't you…no, Spock, don't do that. No, this isn't happening, you're not…you're not…"

As Spock rested one hand on Kirk's cheek, he lost it. His face twisted in grimace and the heave of a sob sent agony through his midsection. Spock wasn't dying. No, he couldn't be; he was the most versatile, most enduring person on the ship…he was half-Vulcan, after all…

Another hand met his other cheek, and Kirk was jolted with what felt like an electrical current that went straight to his heart. It sent a shock through his body, feeling like an explosion contained within his skin. He knew it was some sort of mind meld, but it felt entirely different than the ones they'd shared before or even the one that had taken place on Delta Vega with Spock Prime almost two years prior.

When he snapped out of it, Spock was still smiling at him, his eyes tired. "Goodbye, Jim," he whispered, eyelids heavy and starting to droop.

"No!" Kirk cried. His voice was going hoarse, but it didn't stop him. He clutched desperately at the hands that were beginning to fall from his face, losing his balance and falling onto the half-Vulcan's chest as the last of his life escaped from him. He curled himself around the body, closing his eyes against all of the green blood that was rapidly staining his gold uniform.

He was losing blood too, however much he was not aware of it at the time, and as his head fell to the ground and his own hold started to go slack, the last thing he was aware of as he lost consciousness was one single word.

_Spock_.


	2. Chapter 1

**One**

Kirk awoke in the sickbay, his stomach hurting something awful and his brain feeling a little disoriented.

He didn't know how he'd got there; in fact, he didn't remember anything about what had happened. Trying to sit up proved to be a bad, painful idea, so instead he rested against the bed and looked around.

"Bones," he croaked, his voice raspy.

"Jim! You're awake!" He was there within seconds, running a tricorder over Kirk's body and looking him over with concern. "How are you feeling?"

"Like shit," Kirk told him with a sly grin. "What happened? I don't remember a thing." A quick sweep of the room revealed that he was the only one there; obviously no one else had gotten hurt. That much was good.

Something like pain flashed in McCoy's eyes, and Kirk felt his smirk falter ever so slightly. "You don't remember anything?"

Kirk shook his head, but waved it off. "Ah, it'll probably come back to me eventually. So what happened? It feels like something trying to gnaw its way out of my stomach."

"You've got…you _had_ internal as well as external bleeding, Jim," McCoy told him. "Something hit you real hard down there and gave you a real thrashing. Opened a deep wound under your ribs, cracked a couple, and opened one of the major veins in your stomach. Another half an hour and you'd be a goner."

Despite himself, Kirk grinned. "Well, I'm lucky you were there for me, wasn't I?"

"You don't know the half of it, idiot."

"So I take it Spock's taking care of things on the Bridge? If he wasn't, he'd be here meditating or something. He always is. It's like the guy thinks I'm going to fall at the drop of a hat."

He didn't like the expression that crossed McCoy's eyes.

"What? Did something happen to him too? Is he resting in his quarters?" He shook his head. "Or maybe he's in the lab, then. Did he—"

"Jim!" McCoy's tone was curt, but it was too raw to be angry.

Kirk fell silent.

McCoy took a breath. "Spock's dead."

Even though the look on the doctor's face was too real to be a prank, Kirk laughed anyways. "You're kidding," he told him matter-of-factly, though dread was beginning to pool in the pit of his stomach.

With an exasperated sigh, McCoy closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Kirk, when we got down there, he was already gone," he told him, his voice slow and careful. "The damned thing was going to explode or something again, and we could only bring you back." He paused, taking a deep breath and looking back at the young captain. "I'm sorry, Jim. I'm truly sorry."

The feeling Kirk had wasn't much different than being hit by a train. His heart thudded hard in his chest and his breathing began to quicken again as everything came back to him.

Next thing he knew he was struggling to get up, to get back to the bridge and divert their course, and the machines were going off and McCoy was injecting him with something and everything was going fuzzy.

Then his struggles were weakening and McCoy was holding him down, his face pained and filling Kirk's vision.

_"Damnit, Jim."  
><em>

* * *

><p>Kirk had weird dreams after that.<p>

They felt almost like memories, crystal-clear and lacking in the surreal nature that dreams usually had. That, and he didn't have the usual control one had over their own body. He was running along a rocky path, red sandstone boulders rising around him. The city was right in front of him, and he put on an extra boost of speed to reach it.

Daring a glance back, his heart rose to his throat as he saw the sand fire storm raging not far behind. He needed to be quick if he was to make it there before it reached him.

He ran through the deserted streets, feeling the hot wind beginning to blow against the back of his neck. Relief flooded him when finally he saw his own house, and upon reaching it, threw open the door and dove inside.

A woman rushed over to him, clutching him close, and he embraced her back.

"Oh, Spock," she gasped. "You mustn't scare me like that ever again. You _knew_ there was a storm warning."

"I will try not to, mother," he mumbled, and Kirk's mind was suddenly screaming with confusion.

_Spock?  
><em>

* * *

><p>He woke with a jolt, his eyes flying open and hands gripping the bed sheets on either side of him. Raising a hand to his head, he rubbed his temples and groaned. Did he just dream of one of Spock's memories?<p>

Shaking his head, he sighed and let his hand fall. No, that was absurd. How could he possibly know of that? He'd never even been to the surface of Vulcan before it was destroyed, unless you counted hurtling towards it at breakneck speed with no parachute and clutching your chief physicist like he was your lifeline as 'sightseeing.'

Kirk didn't know how long he'd been out. He looked around the room to confirm that it was empty—the only other person there was an ensign that was asleep a few beds away—and then pulled down the covers that concealed his body. A white bandage was wrapped around the entire length of his torso, and gritting his teeth in pain, he began to pull it off.

It took him a while, but finally he had the skin of his stomach revealed. Angry purple bruising covered his abdomen and just over the left side of his chest, and a healing wound ran from below the right side of his ribs diagonally to his left hipbone. The regenerator strapped to his chest was doing a good job of healing it, though it would take some time yet.

He'd seen worse.

After haphazardly putting the bandage back on—or, half-on, and then covering it with a fresh uniform sitting on the chair beside his bed—he swung his legs over the side of the bed. The fact that he could actually sit up was a very good sign.

Standing, however, proved to be an ordeal. Once the muscles of his stomach were clenching with the effort of being on his feet, they started to hurt. Muttering curses under his breath, Kirk sat back down.

He _needed_ to get back to the Bridge. He needed to get into the swing of things again; he needed to do something to distract him, to keep him from thinking and remembering everything that had happened.

His mental shields were down, he realized too late, as a flood of images bombarded his mind. Images of what had happened, of the whole ordeal, of far too much blood and rain and mud and the explosion and—

"Jim!"

McCoy's shout distracted Kirk from the harmful thoughts, and he whipped his head around to face him.

"Goddamnit, I _will_ sedate you again, and you know it," he growled, stomping over to rip the uniform off of Jim and shove him a little too hard against the bed. Kirk would have made a joke laden with innuendo had he not been gritting his teeth against the pain. "You took off your bandages, didn't you? Of course you did. Have I ever told you that you're the worst patient I've ever had?"

"Many times," Kirk told him with a grin.

"Well, obviously not enough. And I don't think that 'worst patient' quite covers it. Is there even a word in the human language for it? Remind me later, and I'll ask Uhura if there are any in other languages."

Kirk chuckled. "Bones, you're going to give yourself a heart attack."

"No, that'll be _you_ that gives me one," McCoy growled. He reached up a hand, pulling on the hair above his ear. "Look, you're giving me gray hairs."

"I don't see anything other than brown."

"You're not even looking. They're _right there_."

"I think you're kidding with yourself."

"I think you're being intentionally difficult."

"I think so too."

McCoy fixed Jim with a stern glare as he went about fixing Kirk's dressing, being intentionally rough as he wound it around his stomach. "You're impossible."

Kirk beamed back at him.

"I swear to god," McCoy grumbled, finishing with the snip of scissors on the medical tape. "Now you _leave this one on_. Or so help me, you'll need bandages on a lot more than your stomach."

Rolling his eyes, Kirk crossed his arms. "I just wanted to see. I won't do it again."

"Children 'just want to see.' Adults choose to do the responsible thing, the logical thing, and leave it alone."

"It would not be logical to leave injuries unattended and without attention as you propose," Kirk blurted out. "It is, however, logical to assess the severity of one's wounds before trying to exert themselves."

McCoy turned, slowly, with a face of both curiosity and sheer disbelief. The two men stared at each other, equally shocked, before McCoy spoke. "What the _hell?"_

"I don't know!" Kirk cried out. "I didn't say that. It was like…fuck, I don't know, it just came out!" He rubbed a hand against the back of his neck, his gaze flittering nervously around the room. "Jesus Christ, what the hell did you give me?"

"That wasn't any medication there, Jim," McCoy told him. "You sounded like the hobgoblin for a second." Too late he realized what he'd said, and his eyes were immediately wide and apologetic. "Wait, I didn't mean it like that—"

Kirk shook his head. "It's okay."

Looking at him dubiously, McCoy sighed and crossed his arms. "You're going to need to beam back down there with a research crew sooner or later to figure out if the planet is stable," he told him. "We can't take the chance of just assuming it is. Starfleet'll throw a fit."

"I know," Kirk said, running a hand through his hair. "It's not like they won't already."

McCoy rolled his eyes. "Yeah, whatever." He took out a tricorder, taking some more readings on Kirk before straightening himself once more. "I've got to get back to work. If I find your bandages so much as fiddled with, so help me, I'll shove so many hypos in your ass you'll look like a porcupine." He took a few steps, and then turned around again. "And Jim," he continued, "For your own sake, try to get some goddamn rest."

Although he nodded, Kirk knew he would do no such thing. He waited until McCoy had left the room, and then he fell back against the bed with a soft _whumf_. He didn't want to close his eyes; he didn't want to think about what had happened. No, he couldn't become compromised, not when such daunting matters were at hand. And with no First Officer, he couldn't afford to let something happen to him.

Not that it wasn't right now. Kirk had no way of knowing until he got out of the goddamned sickbay.

He'd stay in bed, then, as McCoy had ordered him, and get better. And then he'd go back to command, take over the Delta or Beta shift, and work himself until he dropped.

He managed to make himself sit in that bed for almost an hour and a half. By the end of it he was twitching to get up and move, to go back to work, to do _anything_.

With an exasperated groan, Kirk sat up once again and reached for the sweater McCoy had placed just out of his grasp. He had just about reached it when he was struck with a thought.

They should go to New Vulcan.

He wasn't sure why, he just knew that there was something of great importance there that he needed to be done. Besides, he hadn't been there yet, with the current mission and all.

He'd also need to face Spock's father sooner or later. As much as he was not looking forward to it, he knew that Sarek deserved the news to his face rather than over a phone call. It wasn't necessary, and Kirk dreaded having to tell him what had happened.

Telling him his son was dead.

Telling him _Spock_ was dead.

Kirk let out a sigh and clutched his head in his hands, resting his elbows on his thighs. Squeezing his eyes shut, he shook his head slightly in his grasp. No, he couldn't think about this. Not now. He'd allow himself time to grieve—and _grieving_ was putting it nicely—but not now. He knew that it would gnaw at the edges of his consciousness until he actually _was_ compromised, but hopefully they'd be done by then and he could take a shore leave.

McCoy would request one too, no doubt, to watch over him. He knew that much—McCoy was a painfully obvious man to Kirk. Though other times he took comfort in his friend's presence and care, this time he just wanted to be alone.

He was still sitting with his legs hanging over the side and his head in his hands when one of the nurses returned. For a second she just hovered there, unsure of whether to leave or approach him, before cautiously taking a step forward and placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Captain," she said, her voice gentle.

Kirk sat back up; smiling at her like the whole thing was nothing. "Yes, rest, I know. Bones was very…adamant about that."

Nurse O'Hara. He knew he recognized her. She'd been assigned to the Enterprise right before their mission. She was a quiet thing, incredibly caring and overly sympathizing. More than once Kirk had played up a very minor injury to gain her attention, but now her concern felt almost overbearing.

She smiled back, helping him lie back down and checking at the gauze over his torso. "Don't be too rough on it," Kirk joked. "One little tear and Bones'll have my head, thinking I did it. He told me that clear as day."

Giving him a look, she redressed it and then turned to leave. "McCoy also said if you're not asleep by the time he gets back, he'll make it happen with a blunt object," she told him, a slight smirk on her face. Goodness, the doctor was rubbing off on the other medical officials faster than Kirk had thought.

He nodded to her, watching her leave, and planned the Enterprise's course of events. They'd finish up with Genesis and then they'd go back, stopping at New Vulcan along the way to get it over with.

By the time McCoy got back, Kirk surprisingly _was_ asleep, his face twisted in discomfort and his brow sweating. A quick check from the tricorder revealed this wasn't because of his injuries, and McCoy crossed his arms and shook his head slowly.

"I'm sorry, Jim," he muttered.

* * *

><p><strong>Note<strong>: Tardy update, I'm terribly sorry. Under normal circumstances I usually add chapter much quicker than that, but these are no normal circumstances.

This story _will_ be finished, I've got the whole thing planned out and the next couple of chapters almost done, but there's gunna be a two-week hiatus (until the 10th of April or later). So bear with me, and I'll aim for another two or three updates as soon as I come back! Spock'll come back somewhere in those chapters, too.


	3. Chapter 2

**Two**

It took Kirk only three and a half days to get out of the sickbay.

Which, for him, was three and a half days too many.

He'd done his best badgering McCoy until he'd nearly driven the man mad, and after sucking up his injuries and convincing the medical staff he was fine (though he had a feeling that McCoy knew exactly what he was doing; he always did) he was finally back on the Bridge.

A team had been sent down two days prior to search for Spock's body, to no avail. His tunic had been found, ripped and still stained with his and his Captain's blood, but his body had vanished. As devastated as he was, Kirk made a point of not showing so.

They'd taken the First Officer from the Beta shift to replace Spock for now, and under any other circumstances Kirk would have been pleased to work with her. But right now, he couldn't stop himself from comparing her to his friend, and he grew continuously more frustrated with the fact that she was not. He'd weasel his way around her barriers to get her to let him do whatever he wanted, and where Spock would have argued back until he was blue in the face she would let herself be persuaded by is arguments and sway from her initial position. Kirk found himself purposefully proposing incredulous things, just to get her to disagree with him. The glances he earned from Uhura told him that she was on to him, and more than once Chekov sent him a worried frown at his requests.

"Permission to respectfully disagree with you beaming down yourself, Captain," Uhura growled sarcastically as he prepared the science team to go down and check the stability of Genesis. He himself was suiting up with the blues, his gold uniform sticking out like a sore thumb.

"Permission denied," he told her with a grin and before turning back to the team.

"Well isn't it great that I don't need your permission to call you a dumbass and tell you that this is a bad idea then, _Captain_," she retorted with an icy smile of her own.

Pouting slightly, Kirk paused what he was doing to give her a look. "Now that's just mean."

"I-I agree, Keptin," he heard Chekov state weakly, as if he were afraid of voicing his thoughts. Then again, he was still young, and he never really openly defied him as Uhura did. He loved the kid, but he needed to start sticking up for what he thought. This was a good start. "Ze conditions of which you are to enter are...harmful to your current situation."

"Come on, you too?" Kirk told him with a disappointed shake of his head. Uhura's glare could have frozen over Hell, and Kirk rolled his eyes. "I don't see why you two are worrying. There's nothing down there quite as bad as Delta Vega, now is there?"

Neither said anything, and Kirk resisted the urge to slam his face into his palm. They were unusually tense today. Slipping the last of the necessary gear on, he patted Chekov's back. "I'll be fine, I promise," he said, looking at Uhura afterwards.

If Spock were here, he would have made a comment about it being unwise to promise something he knew he had no power over whether or not he would be able to keep.

But he wasn't, and First Officer Christina Larson just nodded when he told her to command the Bridge and keep it in orbit while they beamed down. No comment regarding his safety, none of that weird, hard-to-follow Vulcan humour, and nothing about how completely _illogical_ he was being in his behavior.

Uhura pointedly didn't look at him as they got into the Transporter room and walked over to the pads, meeting up with McCoy along the way. Chekov was the opposite; continually sending him worried glances before they beamed down.

"I hope you know just how stupid you're being, kid," McCoy growled at him right before they were warped down to the surface. When they did he still wore the same mask of constant distaste he always did, this time trained in his Captain.

With a smile and a clap to his Medical Officer's shoulder, Kirk winked. "Of course I know. What sort of imbecile do you take me for?"

"You don't want me to answer that question," McCoy muttered as they followed the three Science Officers to a nearby group of trees.

"Do you see any life forms of any kind?" one, Officer Sutherland, asked.

Another Kirk knew as Officer Thames shook his head. "Insect life appears tone absent as well."

"We probably just scared them off," Kirk suggested. "Maybe we should wait a bit and then come back. We can try another spot for now."

The ensign, Lee, seemed more than happy to oblige. The other two followed closely behind, obviously unsure of doing anything out of the ordinary of their usual protocol. _Well, screw the protocol_, Kirk thought to himself. Sometimes people had to plot their own course.

It had been a trait of his that had infuriated Spock to no end. His loose grip to doing things by the book, and more often than not completely disregarding the Starfleet manual and doing things impulsively and without much regard to the traditional way of carrying out orders.

It wasn't until the uncomfortable cough of the unusually silent McCoy that Kirk realized where he had subconsciously been taking them. They were near the disaster site; the smell of the burnt machinery was detectable in the air. With a tight smile, he stopped and look back. "Here should be good," he said, watching as Sutherland dropped her bag to rustle through it and Thames took a look around.

Excitement flared through the scientist's face as a small bug leapt through the air in front of him. Immediately he seized it with gloved hands, and Lee was beside him in an instant.

"You were right, Captain," Thames told him with a smile. "We just needed a different location after all."

Lee set to work quickly setting up the instruments to scan the sample as McCoy sat down on a log beside where Kirk stood. "I sure hope to god that thing's not poisonous," he muttered as he looked on.

Kirk grinned, leaning over to smack his friend's shoulder. "Oh, lighten up," he said with a laugh. "There's _life_ here, Bones. That means the mission was a success. We actually created a planet."

"We don't know that yet," McCoy growled as Kirk gave an exasperated snort.

Twenty minutes later found them in the exact same spot save the two officers, who were off to find some different fauna to test, with the young ensign trying to work some weird machinery Kirk had never seen before in his life to sample some of the dirt. He was fruitless in his efforts, and in the end slumped back in defeat.

"Here, lemme give it a go," Kirk suggested, leaning forward to take the thing in his hands. Something about it felt _familiar,_ despite him being quite sure he'd never seen the thing in his life, and after a few seconds with it he had it up and running.

"Thank you, Captain!" Ensign Lee enthused as he quickly set the sample in it. McCoy looked incredibly suspicious, and as Kirk went back to sit beside him he gave him a dubious once-over.

"The hell'd you learn to use that thing?" he grumbled as Kirk sat down.

He shrugged. "I don't know. The thing just clicked together in my hands. It was like they had a mind of their own," he said, with a comical wiggle in the air.

McCoy snorted. "Yeah, I noticed that. You've been acting weird, Jim, with those mutterings about going to Vulcan and those weird logical outbursts, and-"

"That was _twice_—"

"_Four times,_ and I'm not the only one that thinks you've been acting out of sorts."

Kirk looked away, grimacing. "Have I ever told you you worry too much?"

With a roll of his eyes, McCoy forced himself back into Kirk's line of sight. "You have. One of those times was right before you got your ass almost handed in to God's door from that alien poison on that Delta Quadrant planet."

"That was once—"

"It doesn't matter how many times it was, Jim! What matters is that you're a fool to look past your own safety for the sake of keeping up your image with the crew. Seriously, take a break. As soon as we land this goddamned ship, so help me, I'm getting your ass on shore leave so fast..."

He petered out in his sentence, finally left just glaring at his Captain with his face set in a deep scowl.

"I'd warn you of your face sticking like that if you keep that scowl up, but I think it already has," Kirk said in a dry attempt at humour.

He didn't think it was possible for McCoy to deepen his frown, but obviously he'd been wrong.

Before the doctor could say anything to Kirk's comment, Sutherland and Thames came rushing back.

"Captain!" Thames shouted. "We found footprints."

Kirk shrugged. "Then copy them down, analyze them, and see what kind of a creature they belong to."

"We did, sir," Sutherland told him. Was she hesitating in her speech? Kirk thought he was. Odd, Sutherland was _not _one for hesitation when it came to speaking. "They were...humanoid footprints, sir. Very close to those of a human child, though the deep treading near the toes suggest that it was somehow stronger than one." Relieved to have that off her chest, she quickly looked back to Thames to will him to finish speaking.

He caught her pleading look, and stepped forward. "There were also tracks that were much larger, and much more feral. Scannings showed them to be feline, though very, very large. I think we should keep on our guard."

Kirk nodded. "I think so too. Lee! Let's see to it that we get this stuff done before the Alpha Shift is over. We've got a few hours yet."

"Yes, Captain!" Lee enthused, quickly fiddling with some machine before dashing off to grab a sample of something.

Stifling a yawn as he leaned back against the tree, Kirk rested the back of his head on his hands. "I'm bored," he complained to McCoy.

"Good," the doctor growled back. "You aren't supposed to be down here anyways."

With a scowl, Kirk stood to his feet. "I'm going to take a look around, see if I cant find anything myself. If we're gonna get this done before dark, we have to step on it. Now what were they collecting? Bugs?" Kirk reached over to one of the machines and grabbed a pair of gloves and a small bag.

"I'd tell you you're being a _fool_, but I know you wouldn't listen," McCoy scoffed to his back.

Kirk merely grinned at him, and sauntered off.

The planet wasn't much unlike earth, save the slightly pinkish hue the plants seemed to have. That, and there were so many more. It was like a rainforest, without the hot, humid temperatures and abundance if every kind if animal one could imagine.

A flash of movement caught hid eye, and Kirk saw a small deer-like creature grazing on a fern not far away. Instantly dropping behind the cover of a medium-sized shrub and watching from a distance, Kirk was just about to pull out his phaser when it suddenly perked its ears and dashed off.

Kirk wasn't one to take no for an answer, and he shot off after it without giving it much thought. It wasn't quite as fast a runner as the deer back on earth, but it still gave Kirk a run for his money.

What was he running from, anyways? The thought occurred to him, and he slowed down to a stop to take a look around him.

It was a quiet planet to begin with, but now, it almost seemed silent. Taking an uneasy glance around him, Kirk slowly set back the way he came.

He felt that he was being watched. There was the prickly sensation on his back, and still nothing stirred. Glancing around once more, he scanned the area with trained eyes but still saw nothing.

"Goddamnit, Bones, why do you always have to be right?" he muttered to himself as he trod back to camp.

He was most definitely _not_ expecting the growl that answered his question. Whipping around to face the noise, to his utmost frustration he still caught nothing stirring around him. It had been a horrible idea to leave on his own.

A stick dropped in front of his head, and Kirk looked at it dubiously before picking it up. He looked up, wondering where it had come from, and let out a shout of surprise.

He'd found the feline. A huge thing, bigger than him that was built like a Snow Leopard with pinkish brown hair and brilliant green eyes, stared back at him from within the canopy. Before he could get a good look at it, Kirk was running for his life back to camp.

"Bones!" he cried. "McCoy!" He knew he was still too far away, but hoped that somehow the medical doctor would hear him.

The cat let out a yowl and leapt from the trees, landing gracefully on his feet before charging towards him. Kirk faced straight ahead again, trying to put as much distance as he could between him and the cat. But four legs were much faster than two, and Kirk found himself outmatched.

He was just able to dodge to the right behind a tree right as it was upon him, and immediately turned in a different direction. Stupid as it was, changing direction to take a different course, if he kept going the direction of camp he'd be dead.

There was the yell of a human, and suddenly the cat was screeching at the top of its lungs. Risking a glance back, Kirk saw it caught in a net in the air. A child, probably no older than eight, appeared from within a blue-flowered plant and went to survey his prize.

Kirk could have dropped. The dark hair, though long and knotted, and pointed ears were much too familiar. And when the kid turned to face him, the eyes were the exact same as the man Kirk had once known.

"Spock?" he ventured.


End file.
